Tip ONeill: JFK Was Pulling Troops Out of Vietnam

[Gil Jesus]

Former Speaker of the House Thomas "Tip" O'Neill tells of a conversation he had with President Kennedy regarding Vietnam.

 

 

Edited January 16, 2023 by Gil Jesus

[Michael Griffith]

Here we go again with this false choice and strawman assumption that withdrawal/pullout equaled abandonment/total engagement. "I'm gonna get the boys out of Vietnam" did not mean abandoning South Vietnam, and the record is undeniably clear that the withdrawal plan (1) would not be completed until late 1965, (2) was conditional/dependent upon the situation on the ground, (3) would not withdraw all troops but would leave just over 1,000 support troops, and (4) economic and military aid to South Vietnam would continue.

Anyone who argues otherwise needs to deal with the information in Dr. Marc Selverstone's new book The Kennedy Withdrawal. I would also note, again, that even James K. Galbraith admits that under the withdrawal plan we were going to leave 1,500 troops for supply purposes and would continue to aid South Vietnam:

        Training would end. Support for South Vietnam would continue. They had an army of over 200,000. The end of the war was not in sight. After the end of 1965, even under the withdrawal plan, 1,500 US troops were slated to remain, for supply purposes. But the war would then be Vietnamese only, with no possibility of it becoming an American war on Kennedy's watch. (JFK’s Vietnam Withdrawal Plan Is a Fact, Not Speculation (thenation.com)

We need to come to grips with the fact that Oliver Stone got it very wrong when he claimed that NSAM 263 called for total disengagement from South Vietnam, and that JFK was killed because he was going to abandon South Vietnam. 

Edited January 16, 2023 by Michael Griffith

[James DiEugenio]

Funny as heck Mike.

Keep them coming.

Look at the torture these people are going though.

https://www.holidify.com/pages/nightlife-in-hanoi-349.html

Edited January 16, 2023 by James DiEugenio

[Gil Jesus]

22 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

Here we go again with this false choice and strawman assumption that withdrawal/pullout equaled abandonment/total engagement. "I'm gonna get the boys out of Vietnam" did not mean abandoning South Vietnam, and the record is undeniably clear that the withdrawal plan (1) would not be completed until late 1965, (2) was conditional/dependent upon the situation on the ground, (3) would not withdraw all troops but would leave just over 1,000 support troops, and (4) economic and military aid to South Vietnam would continue.

Anyone who argues otherwise needs to deal with the information in Dr. Marc Selverstone's new book The Kennedy Withdrawal.

I don't really care what somebody writes in a book. Would you consider hearing it from the horse's mouth that he was against sending combat troops into Vietnam ? He understood the problem there as early as 1953.

 

 

[Gil Jesus]

16 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Funny as heck Mike.

Keep them coming.

Look at the torture these people are going though.

https://www.holidify.com/pages/nightlife-in-hanoi-349.html

I'm sorry but I don't buy all that BS that JFK was some kind of Anti-Communist cold warrior who was going to defend South Vietnam from falling into Communist control with the very last drop of American blood. Any book written on that premise I wouldn't waste my money on.

JFK didn't give a rat's ass about the spread of Communism.

He tried to save the life of the Socialist Prime Minister of the Congo, Patrice Lumumba.

He didn't support the overthrow of the Communist Castro.

He sold jet fighters to the Communist Tito regime in Yugoslavia, then trained the Communist Yugoslav pilots at an Air Force base in Texas.

He sold wheat to the Communist Russians. And negotiated with them to end the Missile Crisis and the Test Ban Treaty.

This President was no war hawk.

If anything, he was pursuing a stalemate in Vietnam similar to the one in Laos, but he wasn't going to commit ground troops in Asia. Gen. MacArthur had warned him against it and he took the General's advice very seriously. Besides, he knew what the score was in Vietnam as early as 1953.

The record indicates that Kennedy was trying to disengage from Vietnam. It also indicates that he resisted time and time again advice from his "experts" to introduce ground forces. 

Any book that promotes an opposite thesis isn't worth the paper it's printed on, IMO.

 

[James DiEugenio]

You are correct Gil.

You cannot divorce Vietnam from Kennedy's evolving ideas about colonialism in the Third World, and especially Indochina.

Kennedy was told in1951  by Seymour Topping and Edmund Gullion that France had little or no chance of winning there.  That the war was not about capitalism versus communism.  It was about nationalism vs imperialism.. And if America tried to do the same, she would  fail also. And this colored everything Kennedy did on this issue after.

Especially the Algeria speech of 1957 in which he said not only should we not back France against Algeria, but we should convince France to go to the negotiating table.

This is why he refused to countenance combat troops in 1961. And on November 27th, he fairly shouted: when policy is decided, you either follow it or you get out. He then asked : who will implement my policy on Vietnam?  McNamara raised his hand.  And this is how he became the point man on this withdrawal issue.

Let me quote Selverstone at the debate he lost in Georgia: "I believe that the two of them are working together, but it is McNamara's withdrawal plan...."

Then he says this, 

"My question here is, when does Kennedy find out about the withdrawal plan?....When is Kennedy briefed about these matters?" (VIrtual JFK, p. 129)

These are Marc Selverstone's own words.  As they were tape recorded at this conference.

Its the same thing that Chomsky tries to say.  When all the ARRB evidence poured out certifying Kennedy was getting out, Chomsky--to save face-- tried to say, well it was really McNamara's idea.  And this is what Mr. Miller Center--along with Steve Gillon and others--now tries to throw out there.

This is pure baloney.  Why?  Because in the early debates about Vietnam, McNamara wanted to commit tens of thousands of combat troops! 

It was only after he got instructions from Kennedy that he changed his mind on the issue. And this is not single sourced, its triple sourced.  

I am now really looking forward to reviewing this book.